Journal of Sacred Work

Day 31 - Perpetual Beginnings

"...we will never be anything else but beginners, all our life!" - Thomas Merton

   Our innate wisdom tells us Merton is right. As monotonous as some tasks seem, each time we do one of them we are doing that thing for the first time. The nurse, the surgeon, and the social worker interviewing her fifth client of the day would all do well to remember this wisdom. It may feel like the thousandth time for them, but it may be the first time for the patient.
   My granddaughter is living her first January. How many have you lived? Does each one still feel new and exciting to you? At the end of this month, we have the opportunity to reflect on how many years we have begun and what new things and new people we will encounter this year...

Day 30 - Changing Energy & A Gift From Whyte

"I am how I feel ."    -Katrina in Who Loves Judas, by Dane Dakota 

   In so many ways, we are how we feel at this moment. Our history is stored within us in every cell of our body. Our body may well remember what our mind does not and vice versa. But, our persona is shaped by the mood of the moment. We can see this idea reflected in the powerful film, Persona, directed by film legend Ingmar Bergman and staring Liv Ullman (at left in photo from film)
   Sure, we can put on masks and pretend we're feeling fine when we may feel exhausted. Yet, the truth will emerge. The caregiver may adopt the costume of a caring heart when, in truth, she may be carrying within her, years of anger and bitterness...

Day 29 - On Being Community

[The following entry was written by Cathy Self, Sr. V.P. of the Baptist Healing Trust]   

   The Journal entries of late seem to have the thread of community woven throughout – a community against injustice, a community of caring for an individual, a community of faith. In writing about community, Henri Nouwen has suggested community is, first of all, a quality of the heart. This quality emerges from a spiritual knowing, says Nouwen, that we are alive not for ourselves but for one another. Community is the fruit of our capacity to make the interests of others more important than our own. Community is certainly central to our practice of radical loving care. Yet community calls us to connect with others who may, in some ways, feel different and strange...

Day 28 - Self Compassion vs. Self Pity

The difference between compassion & pity is the difference between Love & condescension.

   In the summer of 1997, despair overtook me. As the result of an acquisition, I was fired from my position as Chief Operating Officer of a publicly-traded company. With proceeds from the sale of the company, I had the freedom to do anything I wanted. But, after years of working, I could think of nothing to do. 
   This, of course, made no sense. Neither did it make any sense to my friends that I would feel depressed. "You've got a wonderful family, your health, and plenty of money," one dear friend said to me. "What have you got to be depressed about?" As most caregivers would already understand, the seeds of depression had been planted...

Day 25, 26, 27 - Open Forum

   How is your journey across 2008 proceeding? How are you doing with your New Year's resolution to Live Love, not fear?
   To share your thoughts on caregiving, click on "Comments" (below)

Day 24 - Hinduism & Love

As a person puts on new clothes and discards old and torn clothes, similarly an embodied soul enters new material bodies, leaving the old bodies.(Bhagavad Gita  2:22)   

   The aroma of incense was what struck me first as I began my maiden voyage into a Hindu temple. Fortunately, I had a marvelous guide in the form of Rajiv Gupta, a friend.
   So much of the confusion and intolerance that blows across the world arises from misunderstanding and ignorance. This intolerance is sometimes furthered by various kinds of fundamentalists who think it's heresy to try and understand any other faith. Accordingly, they may tell followers they are not allowed to enter any other place of worship. I've always wondered why they're so afraid.
   The challenge for caregivers is always to learn how to embrace diversity....

Day 23 - Loving Purpose - A Must-See Movie for Caregivers!

There comes a time when the heaping up of calamities brings on uncontrollable nervous laughter - when, after a final blow from fate, we decide to treat it all as a joke. - Jean-Dominque Bauby, author of The Diving Bell and the Butterfly.

   When is the last time a movie changed the way you look at life? That's what the promotional language for the best film of the year says. They're right. If The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is showing at any theater within twenty-five miles of you, please go see it. Although created for the world, this story is truly a Love message to caregivers...

Day 22 - Our Legacies

   In the wake of Martin Luther King Day, I wonder how you would evaluate your legacy. From the standpoint of fame, we all pale in comparison with the great people of history. Our legacies will have a smaller audience. But that doesn't mean they won't be important.
    Recognizing that legacies are sometimes about our egos, how would you like to be remembered? There's an old saying that we are not recalled for what we did but for how we made people feel? If this is true, how are we doing? I remember each of the people from the family photo taken in 1945. (I'm at bottom, left, in the hands of my young mom, who is now 95.)
   Consider the people you know who have passed away- family members for example. How do you remember them in terms of what they did versus how they made you feel?...   

Day 21 - King at Rest - Passion's Price

To live a Christian life means to live in the world without being of it.  - Henri Nouwen

   His days of straining, struggling, and suffering on our behalf ended suddenly on an April night in Memphis. I am always stunned when I remember he was only thirty-nine.
   Martin Luther King, Jr. must have experienced many days when he resented his calling. He was living in this world, as Nouwen says, but, like all saintly people, he periodically transcended it. Being a part of this world, for KIng, meant enduring prison, hot summers of doubt, and the agonizing rejection of many of his peers - some because they thought he was too radical, some because they thought he was not radical enough...

Days 19 & 20 - Weekend reflection

For what are weekends for but rest and reflection
against the hard realities of a regular week
of life?

What are your thoughts on this eve of the Martin Luther King holiday?

Day 18 - A Prayer for Caregivers

[Ed. note]  One of our most faithful and loving caregivers and Journal writers is Liz Wessel, R.N., M.S., who works with the St. Joseph's Health System based in Orange, California. She has composed the following prayer/poem for caregivers.
   In addition, she is also the artist who created the exceptional drawing at left. In her meditation, Liz reaches out to all caregivers, knowing that each caregiver often works in the midst of grief.
   Thank you, Liz, for sharing your gifts. Here is her writing:

Day 17 - The Passion of a King

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in his Letter From a Birmingham Jail, April 16, 1963

    We celebrate King's life, formally, on the third Monday of January. He was actually born on January 15, 1929. His eloquent Letter From a Birmingham Jail was composed when he was only thirty-four. Five years latter, an assassin's bullet would steal this man from us at the age of only thirty-nine. Before that awful April day, he lived a life of passion that illuminates our world to this day.
   Martin Luther King, Jr. was a penultimate example of a purposeful man driven by passion. His stunning commitment to living Love is evident to all who choose to examine his life and example. In an important way, we may see him as a leading caregiver...

Day 16 - Specific Purpose

Next moment I had moved onto a flattish exposed area of snow with nothing but space in every direction.   -Sir Edmund Hillary's description of reaching the top of Mt. Everest on May 29, 1953

   The objective of climbing Mt. Everest could not have been be more clear and precise. When Hillary and his climbing partner, Tenzing Norgay (in photo at left taken by Hillary) achieved their goal, they knew it. In mountain climbing, victory is measured, marked and photographed.
   The goals of Love are often ill-defined and elusive. When we live Love, how do we know if we have actually achieved anything specific? ...

Day 15 - Purpose & Suffering

Suffering shapes the life force, sometimes into anger, sometimes into blame and self-pity. Eventually it may show us the wisdom of embracing and loving life.  - Rachel Remen, M.D.

   Perhaps our suffering shapes us in the way that a chisel sculpts marble. The pain of each blow makes its mark. And it is the repeated blows that bring real change. We may emerge stronger. Or we may emerge beaten down and twisted, especially if we remain trapped in self-pity. But we are changed, nevertheless.
   Many know the comment attributed to Michelangelo that sculpture involved, for him, freeing the beauty from the marble block before him. In any case, suffering always tells us a lot about the quality of our purpose...

Day 14 - Answer Quick, God!

   The picture at left (click to enlarge) is a nice way to start today, or any day. Two babies, in a random encounter, are fascinated with each other. Their parents, preoccupied with other transactions, are unaware of the gentle interaction transpiring behind their backs.
   These infants know nothing about hurrying and are free of worry. Their parents have experienced all the anxieties velocity can bring.
   Recently, I asked a senior hospital executive with whom I do some coaching how she was doing finding time for reflection. "Well," she said, "I try hard to set aside time in the morning to ask God's help. Sometimes, I'm in such a rush, I feel like saying, 'Answer quick, God, I'm in a heck of a hurry.'"...

Days 12 & 13 - Open Forum - Flying Kites

   The weekend provides an opportunity to reflect on the close of the first two weeks of this year of Living Love.  Now is the time when early resolutions can begin to fade.
   In the course of evaluating balance, I often feel a need to give myself a light tug, the way I would when, as a child, I was trying to keep a kite afloat in the California wind. The kite would catch those steady winds along the Pacific coast, dancing, diving, soaring. Without an occasional tug to draw in slack, the kite was at risk for tailing down into the ocean. On the other hand, as the wind stiffened, more line needed to be played out lest the panes of the kite fall victim to rips and tears.
   How do you make adjustments as you travel your own spiritual journey?...

Day 11 - Begin Again - Thoughts on Personal Commitment to Love

[The following post was written by Cathy Self, Sr. V.P. of the Baptist Healing Trust]

   I understand personal commitment to be a quality of voluntarily fulfilling, an obligation. An obligation seems to be generally regarded as something that is legally or morally compelling. What makes personal commitment "personal" is the voluntary aspect.
   Mother Teresa may be among the most compelling examples of personal commitment. She demonstrated personal commitment by voluntarily choosing to follow her sense of call in serving the poorest of the poor...

Day 10 - Trusting Love

   She's one of the most admired charity leaders in Tennessee and I've referred to her often - partly because she has a way of speaking in quotable phrases. So I listened carefully after I asked Rev. Becca Stevens (left) founder of Magdalene in Nashville, How do you drive away fear?
   "I don't try to drive away fear," she said. "Instead, I just tell myself, trust Love. When I do that, there's no room for fear in my heart."
   Because of her work out on the streets offering sanctuary to prostitutes and drug addicts, Rev. Stevens often finds herself walking through dangerous territory. "Trust Love, I tell myself, and it always seems to work."...

Day 9 - Preparing for Commitment - Continued

Love grows like a flower from within the earth. It does not come from without. Love, like hate, can only work on us from the inside.

   Whether our lives are suffused with bitterness, hate and apathy or flooded with compassion and Love, these things will be revealed in our lives and who we are. Even those who are skillful at hiding their hate will always disclose their true selves through their actions. This is why it is so important that we cultivate Love. The only way to engage meaningful change is to allow Love to grow from within.
   The happy news is that Divine Love is waiting for us. But it will not rise up through force of will. Instead, it seems to flow from the opposite. It is surrender that enables the arrival of Love's light... 

Day 8 - Preparing Ourselves for Change

"Usually people will tolerate a brief dabbling in the 'inward journey,' but then it is time to get on with the real business in the real world." - Richard J. Foster, Celebration of Discipline

 Foster's statement is so accurate it's painful. Most of us just "dabble" in the inward journey. We travel a few inches into the difficult territory of the soul, then turn and retreat to the "real" world when the going gets tough. Perhaps this is the reason we're so attracted to surface transactions. External transactions are an easy alternative to more meaningful inner work.
   The inward journey of spiritual discovery is far more challenging than the external climbing of Mt. Everest....